Factors Influencing Tourist Destination Selection And Future Opportunities And Challenges For Tourism Industry

Based on your knowledge of the factors and conditions that encourage tourism, find articles (minimum 2 articles) that could explain the high attraction in destinations of your choosing.

Find two articles that highlight what may be missing in countries that tend to be avoided.

As per Plog’s Continuum (page 44), elaborate on which personality characteristics would travel to the destinations you have chosen as being more popular.

Detail which personality characteristics would choose destinations that are viewed as being less popular. How can these destinations that are “avoided” use their “off the beaten track” image to their advantage?

What, do you foresee, are some of the future opportunities and challenges facing the tourism industry? Explain why.

Marks will be assigned for:

1. Completeness and accuracy (report covers the above questions and follows direction)
2. Critical analysis (your assessment of the articles researched, including your analysis of Plog’s Continuum and the future of tourism)

3. Synthesis and application (your insight into and interpretation of articles researched)
4. Writing Style and Mechanics

The Attraction of Popular Tourist Spots like Disneyland and Walt Disney World

Tourism is a leisure activity which is performed by people who enjoys it. Travelling for the purpose of enjoyment or for relaxing is approached by different people in a different manner. The selection of place is the biggest and the main criteria which explains what type of a tourist is that person. People who want to have fun and do some family activities together will definitely go to a place which will offer that, while people wanting a peaceful but adventurous time will opt for a place which will provide them with that. The world of tourism is changing and will change furthermore with time.

Disneyland and Walt Disney World are destination which caters to a lot of tourists throughout the year. These places are very popular among children, teenagers and parents. The high attraction of these places is their live animated world which these places offer in the form of theme parks, castles, resorts and many other activities. The parks have some of the scariest and magnificent rides for each age group (Kim, Hyo-Jung & Si-Joong KIm, 2012). These parks successfully create the magical world of fairy tales which every child listens to during their childhood. It’s a popular place amongst tourists and it’s increasing in huge number every year. The similarity between these places is there many rides like the small world, peter pan flight, Space Mountains, pirates of the Caribbean and many other rides. Both these places have theme parks which are based on Disney movies and stories. These places have a magical kingdom which is also very similar. All these fascinating things which both these places offer makes them popular amongst people and one of the most visited places in the world. These places offer the tourists with a fascinating world which fills the tourists with excitement and enthusiasm. All these attributes about these places makes them popular amongst people (Brownell, 2008).

All countries do not have the same security levels like the most developed countries of the world. There are places where the crime rates are huge and thus these places do not have very high rates of tourists, due to their bad reputation amongst the people. Places like Mexico, Haiti, Columbia and many more are some of the dangerous places in the world. It is due to the high rates of robbery, kidnapping, murders and many other dangerous crimes. Tourist travel to a place to create happy memories with their friends and family (Wörndl, Hefele & Herzog, 2017). But there are places which have to be avoided due to their bad reputation. There are also many places which have a very strong political influence which creates problems for foreign people and such places have to be definitely avoided. Some places like Iraq, Iran and many places in Saudi Arabia have some weird rules and people have been made captive for them. The popular movie “Argo” is a very popular example of tourist stuck in a foreign land. These places can be visited only by jeopardizing one’s life. This is due to these reasons which makes these places very unpopular amongst tourists. These places also does not fulfill the needs and desires of major tourists around the world (Pan, 2010).

Places to Avoid

According to the Plog model, the people who will visit Disneyland and Walt Disney World belong to the dependables category. These people are less adventurous, they like family trips and for them travelling means relaxation and spending quality time with family and friends. All these are the possible traits which are needed by a person to visit places like the Disneyland and Walt Disney World which are popular family spot (Barry, 2016). According to Plog, dependables are people who go on short vacations and spend only a specified amount of money on their travelling. The Dependables are nothing like the venturers who like adventurous stuff and spend a lot of money on their travelling trip. All places cannot cater to the needs and wants of the dependables. Like the market have various segments of people, the tourist also has various segments, which also describes the places which the dependables and the venturers visit. The dependables do not look for new places or new activities which require some risk and a lot of courage. The dependables main priority is their time with their friends and family. The Disneyland and Walt Disney World are the most popular family vacation spot and during festivals these places are even more crowded (Neuts, Romao, Nijkamp & van Leeuwen, 2013).

According to Plog, places which are not that popular amongst people and the world still knows very little about them are places which will be visited mostly by people who belong to the category of venturers. The venturers like to explore a new place before anybody else. They like the mystery which is attached to a place. They are explorers who have the tendency to learn from their travelling experience, that’s why they like going to places which are very less popular amongst people (Bassett, 2013). There are tourists who look for peaceful places which are less popular amongst people. These places should use these techniques for tourists who are looking for a less crowded and peaceful vacation. Today, every popular place is jam packed with people, which also ruins many people vacations and holidays. The places that are avoided should publicize their traits which are related to relaxing holidays and also the chance to explore a new place along with many different qualities that are still unknown and undiscovered. The places should also tell the world about their distinctive cultural heritage. There are many places which were initially considered as off the beat places, but today are very prominent amongst people for example Bali and Indonesia (Bhosale, 2015).

Personality Traits Associated with Popular Tourist Destinations

According to Plog, the various popular and unpopular places amongst people can witness a change in the level of people visiting these places. A popular place can witness a downfall in the percentage of tourists visiting it and an unpopular place can get a high percentage of tourists. According to Plog, all these changes happen with the change in time. This is the future of the tourism industry. This highlights the various opportunities and challenges which the tourism industry will face with the changing time (Nicholls, 2013). The opportunities are arising for less popular places as in todays’ world be it an allocentric tourist or pscyhocentric tourist, everyone wants a peaceful and clean environment for their holidays. Places which have been unpopular have witnessed a steady rise in their tourist percentage. The challenges are for the places which have got over crowded in the past few years and are unable to fulfill the rise in the demands of the people. This is the perfect case of a rise in demand, but there is a shortage of supply. With the changing time the demand will increase more, but the supply will not be fulfilled and this will be the main downfall of such places (Le, 2017).

Conclusion

The tourism industry is going through a change. Not only does the people’s choice of place is changing, but there are demographic changes in the tourism industry too. The biggest change is being witnessed in the tourism industry that is currently very low but in the next few years it will be more prominent. There is a high percentage of tourists who belong to the category of senior citizen and the baby boomers. This change has forced the tourism industry to bring changes by focusing their strategies on the senior citizen too. The baby boomers are the people who belong to the venturers category, these people like experimenting with their lives and have huge wealth which they want to spend on new and adventurous experience.

References

Barry, K. (2016). Diagramming: A creative methodology for tourist studies. Tourist Studies.

Bassett, J. (2013). “Everyone a Tourist”. Places Journal, (2013).

Bhosale, R. (2015). Entrepreneurial Training & Development in Tourist Places. Atithya: A Journal Of Hospitality, 1(2).

Brownell, J. (2008). A Commentary on “Leading Change with the 5-P Model: `Complexing' the Swan and Dolphin Hotels at Walt Disney World”. Cornell Hospitality Quarterly, 49(2), 206-210.

Kim, Hyo-Jung, & Si-Joong KIm. (2012). Impact of Daejeon ppuri park tourist attraction selection attribute on tourist satisfaction and behavioral intentions: Image of tourist attraction as a moderated effect. Journal Of The Economic Geographical Society Of Korea, 15(4), 735-751.

Le, A. (2017). Trump’s presidency: the future of American tourism industry. Journal Of Tourism Futures, 3(1), 8-12.

Neuts, B., Romao, J., Nijkamp, P., & van Leeuwen, E. (2013). Digital Destinations in the Tourist Sector: A Path Model for the Impact of E-Services on Tourist Expenditures in Amsterdam. SSRN Electronic Journal.

Nicholls, S. (2013). Not So Different After All: Tourism Industry Members' Opinions Regarding Recent and Future Tourism Issues. Tourism Analysis, 18(6), 731-735.

Pan, S. (2010). Media strategies for marketing places in crisis. Improving the images of cities, countries, and tourist destinations. Current Issues In Tourism, 13(2), 195-198.

Wörndl, W., Hefele, A., & Herzog, D. (2017). Recommending a sequence of interesting places for tourist trips. Information Technology & Tourism, 17(1), 31-54.